Support Is Growing For Openly Carrying Permitted Weapons

MUST HAVE A PERMIT, BUT &#8230;

An eruption in a simmering dispute over gun rights occurred when James Goldberg, wearing camouflage clothing and a holstered — and licensed — pistol on his right hip, walked into a Chili's restaurant in upscale Glastonbury, where he intended to pay for a takeout order.

According to Goldberg, a college-educated, occupational safety engineer, a restaurant employee, concerned by the sight of an armed customer, called the town police department. A goggle-eyed luncheon crowd watched three officers roll up, confront Goldberg and handcuff him.

"What can we get him for?" Goldberg, 32, says one of the officers asked his colleagues.

The answer, as it turned out, was nothing.

A state Superior Court judge dismissed the breach of peace charge police ultimately filed against Goldberg, forcing law enforcement experts to concede that, absent extenuating circumstances, there is nothing in Connecticut law to prohibit licensed gun owners from conducting their lives visibly armed.

The judge's decision was treated as a vindication by some gun owners in traditionally gun-shy Connecticut. They are joining groups elsewhere in asserting, as Goldberg does, what they say is the right to carry sidearms openly, in public, for protection.

The "open carry" movement is growing at a time when the federal courts have been looking more favorably on the rights of gun owners than on the authority of governments to restrict gun ownership.

There are three federal lawsuits pending in Connecticut that challenge the way the state enforces gun laws. In one, Goldberg is suing Glastonbury over his arrest three years ago, claiming he was charged even though there is no state law against openly carrying a sidearm.

In the other two, Goldberg and M. Peter Kuck, a member of the state Board of Firearms Permit Examiners, argue separately that arbitrary enforcement of state gun laws by biased police officers has denied or delayed the issuance of handgun permits, resulting in a denial of due process rights to gun owners.

Kuck, as a member of the board that hears appeals from gun owners who have been denied permits or whose permits have been revoked, is indirectly attacking the work of his board. Goldberg argues that he was wrongly denied a pistol permit for nearly two years after the dismissal of his arrest.

A federal judge in Hartford dismissed both permit suits. But in late March, a federal appeals court in New York overturned the dismissals and sent the cases back to Hartford for further review.

Balancing Interests

Goldberg's arrest, the success of the lawsuits and an increasingly vocal open-carry movement have attracted the attention of state law enforcement experts and policymakers who are concerned with balancing the potentially conflicting interests of openly armed gun owners against those who may become alarmed by the sight of guns.

"I think people have the right to bear arms," said state Rep. Stephen D. Dargan, D-West Haven and co-chairman of the legislature's public safety committee. "How they bear those arms in public is another issue. If I'm a store owner and I see someone walk in with a gun, maybe I pull out the gun I keep under the counter. Maybe I call the police. Maybe they come running in with their guns drawn, because they don't know what's going on."

In the past two years, open carry has become part of the national gun discussion. The Starbucks coffee chain put the issue before a broad audience earlier this year when it decided to allow obviously armed customers into its stores in states that permit open carry. Virginia, Tennessee and Arizona have enacted laws allowing openly armed patrons to drink in barrooms.

Student gun clubs at Connecticut's state universities joined a national push earlier this month to compel public universities to permit armed students to attend classes.

Also this month, Connecticut gun owners staged a Second Amendment rally at the state Capitol.

No one in Connecticut is predicting that the suits or the evolving discussion of gun rights will result in a spike in the number of armed shoppers at suburban malls. But the talk alone has law enforcement officers and policymakers re-examining the existing law and how it should be enforced.

Even through it may be legal for a permitted gun owner to carry a pistol or revolver in public in Connecticut, the officials say every case is not necessarily legal and they will closely examine those brought to their attention.

"There is no law that expressly prohibits the open carrying of a firearm by somebody who has a permit to carry it, in and of itself," said Chief State's Attorney Kevin Kane. "But there are statutes that could very well be violated, depending on the evidence and the circumstances. And that could lead to arrest, confiscation and forfeiture of firearms that are displayed in violation of those statutes."